Thursday, 26 February 2009

The latest on Geert Wilders is that he's currently in the US promoting his vile filmFitna at the invitation of Republican senator Jon Kyl (yes, they let him in, which shows up our government's decision not to even more). And where better for Wilders and his ridiculous hair to peddle his right-wing propaganda than on Fox News in an interview with Bill O'Reilly, who immediately seizes the opportunity to tell Wilders how badly he thinks he was treated by us Brits and proclaim that the US is a "much more open-minded country".

It's fairly indulgent stuff (although O'Reilly does challenge him at the beginning by saying you could make a 15-minute film about any religion that makes it look bad), and while Wilders claims that he has "nothing against Muslims", he then goes on to state that he would "halt immigration from Muslim countries".

To me, the most telling line from the interview comes when Wilders tries to justify why his film is a true depiction of the nature of Islam:

"I didn't use actors in the film. I used real images combined with certain verses from certain Suras"

"Certain verses from certain Suras". Surely no one could accuse him of cherrypicking?

I agree with above commenters. One could also accuse messrs Dawkins and Hitchens of cherrypicking events and religious passages to make their atheistic points, but that doesn't invalidate their points of view.I've seen Fitna and thought it a hideous film. It is arguably factually correct, but that just makes it one element in a larger argument. I find it unfortunate that there has not emerged a reasonable religious defence against the film's accusations. It comes across as an anti-Muslim film, and yet it is moderate Muslims who suffer first at the hand of their fanatical brethren.That missing element means that there's too much focus on the perceived fascism of Wilders' position.

FishNChimps, Fitna Remade by the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain is an interesting response.

It is not exactly a rebuttal of Fitna, more a refinement. Fitna was a rocket fired indiscriminately into a civilian population. Fitna Remade resets the coordinates to target the jihadist combatants and avoid collateral casualties.

Straightforward? Wilders makes an uninformed and highly selective use of a complex mythological tradition to nail a political movement. An upsetting movement, sure. But equating Islamism with Islam is a nasty piece of ignorance, and what's worse, it's more rhetoric than it is opinion. So he hasn't just come to a dumb conclusion in his library; he's come to a dumb conclusion and then started stirring other dumb people up.

You're a big fan of generalizations, Martin - Islamism is 'certainly' worse than Nazism, and 'anyone' who thinks FITNA is vile (and it truly, truly is) is 'certainly' not a humanist. You come up with some measurements for suffering, and some qualifications to be a humanist, and we'll have a right old talk.